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Sorry guys I don't understand please enlighten me...

I got an email from you yesterday - for those of you outside the inner circle, let me share some of the content...

"With such a large number of people signed up we've actually run out of space at the venue. This means that unfortunately we will have to be strict on the door and only let people in who are on the list. So please don't bring any additional friends of colleagues!"

- oops look like you were too slow to sign up.

"We're keeping the venue a secret so that we can mantain the event's exclusivity"

- what!

Now I don't whether this has been driven by:

a) the fact that you can't find a big enough venue or

b) you are trying to create some exclusive club here

If it's (a) I obviously sympathise with the fact that a lot of work has gone into finding a venue big enough, and it just hasn't worked out for you.

However if it's (b), then surely it's going against everything web2.0, social networking sites and twitter is all about. Surely it's about being inclusive, about encouraging as many people to participate as possible.

If people aren't sure about Twitter, what better way to get them involved than being in a pub with a load of people who are already using Twitter.

England are playing football on Wednesday night, I am sure there is a pub which isn't showing the football but would love to have 100+ Twitter geeks drinking their beer and talking twaddle all night.

If you can't find a venue maybe put the word out, collobarate with you fellow recruitment twitters and ask them if they know of a suitable venue.

Look you guys are doing a great job promoting the industry and forgive me for speaking out, but if you are trying to create some exclusive club, I think that's wrong.

We're not trying to create any kind of exclusive club - well, other than the fact that by definition a Recruitment Tweetup is intentionally for those involved in recruitment and actively participating on twitter, so actually I guess we are.

This is something being done from the goodness of our heart and through personal time on the behalf of Jamie & Matt and has just exploded to a level of interest that wasn't foreseen. We have no budget to hire anywhere - nor to guarantee a certain spend (who knows if those signed up will actually be able to turn up - especially with football on).

You're becoming quite a cynic in your old age Mr Cartwright. Perhaps, however, if the thought of partaking in something that could be perceived as being exclusive (even though places were clearly allocated on a purely first signed up first allocated basis) makes you uncomfortable you could let us know you're not attending and we'll pass the good news onto someone on the waiting list.

Morning Al. I think you are meant to get out of bed the right side, you obviusly did the other way this morning ;-)
Firstly, we have a venue sorted, 70 capacity, central, private bar so the uber geeks wont get scared off by the normal people etc.
Secondly, the idea was not to make it a private members club, in fact it’s the total opposite. Nicely, I can meet you for a beer anytime. The idea was to meet some of the Twitter folk we’ve never met in person before, there for extending our network past the confinends of 140 charectors. The reason we are being are a bit cloak and dagger is because in our industry, if someone opens a letter you can hear the sound or corks popping in the background, it does’nt take much to get people out and drinking. It will get to 5.25, everyone would have been paid, you’ve got some pretty senior agency guys attending anyway and bam! It’s small circle with 0 enthasis on if you use Twitter or not. For me that holds no value what so ever. This industry does’nt need another Small Circle.

And outside that we have a sponsor buying the beers, which could lead to the people attending with the wrong intentions.

Well let me just apologise to the industry as a whole for my "crime". It would appear that when I was writing my email to attendees late last night (I do have a very busy day job)I neglected to put inverted commas round the word "exclusive" or explain the situation as eloquently as Jamie has above.

The event isn't an exclusive club but it needs to focussed and clear to give people value for turning up. We were expecting 20ish people we now have nearly 100 interested and again I must apologise for not being a mind reader and predicting this

Lots of very generous people have given up their time and in some cases money to help and I think it's a shame when people feel the need to take cheap shots.

You're right this is social media and therefore open. This means there are no exclusive rights to organising a Recruitment Tweetup.

Can I suggest Al that if you feel you could have done it better then you just organise your own

OK guys, I think I apologised twice in my post for expressing an opinion I knew you wouldn't agree with. I also recognise the great job you're doing, so no crimes have been committed.

Just think that the more people that can attend these gigs the better. If there isn't a venue to accommodate the masses the so be it. However I don't think all this secret venue / exclusivity malarky is particularly...well particularly inclusive.

By the way, more than happy to help out with the organisation next time.

I didn't really see the 'secret venue' or 'exclusive' bit as anything other than what it was - trying to make light of the fact that, due to oversubscription, Matt/Jamie are a bit screwed/embarrassed. Nothing more.

I agree it should be open to all, and it was, but now it can't be, and so this is how it is. Next time they'll know better. Is that a major crime or a personal attackt on anyone - me thinks not.

I thought we'd moved on from this them and us thing and were all friends again... Shame really, life was just getting nice and friendly again - this didn't really do a lot to help and seems to have created an issue out of something that really wasn't there.

Oh well. It's Friday afternoon and I've just had some really great news about a good friend so I'm in a happy place. Maybe you should go to your happy place for 5 mins Mr C - you're normally not quite so angry - it seems a little out of character... I'm in a great mood.

Its a forum - Al is allowed to express an opinion - others to disagree - a bit of passion is to be encouraged and what the hell - we can all handle a little dig at each other too. Personally speaking this sort of disagreement is exactly what i like reading when i am clearly not doing anymore work on a friday afternoon. More please!
And i have every sympathy with the mechanics of organising any sort of event like this - its a pain in the arse - so well done to Matt and Jamie

Blimey we haven't had a comments string like this for a while! To clarify it was a "secret" venue for these reasons

1) We wanted to start advertising and gauge response first so we knew what kind of venue we needed

2) We wanted to keep out the "Farringdon Freeloaders", well the ones who don't use Twitter anyway ;-)

3) We wanted to create a bit of a buzz...obviously we have!

4) We wanted to give ourselves flexibility to switch venues as numbers dictated. Unfortuntaely we're now dealing with such a large number (100+ people) this is probably going to be tough but hey we'll try

At the end of the day I'm just really pleased that so many people are using Twitter and want to come. In, what is turning out to be a pretty terrible year for our industry, it's great to be doing something positive and I'd really hate it to become negative over a pretty minor misunderstanding

Amazing how the world and his dog is now desparate to come to this, my perception was exactly what I think all of us thought it was going to be.. a small group of slightly nerdy early adopters of twitter having a beer with a few likeminded people. Instead I don't think I spoke with anyone at the Onrec awards who didn't claim to be going or know someone who would "Get them in". It feels suddenly like I'm on the guest list for the wedding of a minor sleb and the paps are smelling blood.
Well, at least I'm on the list, amazingly that will be 2 nights out in London in as many weeks.. Considering how evening event phobic I've become over the years it's something of a revelation for me!

I'm coming 400 miles for this. It'd better be bloody worth it! Actually, I was only tentative when I added my name to the list. But now that it's a Who's Who of online recruiting, I'm glad I did, and will definitely be there. In fact any non-attendees would be right to feel a bit out of it. I'm positive there will be venues fighting to welcome so many thirsty customers so soon after pay day.

And if anyone's interested, the centre of the Inner Circle, is wherever I happen to be standing at the time. ;)

woo hooo, this should be fun. Glad I signed up early. Interesting that the big discussion reverts to the blog and comments - which is an interesting commentary on the Twitter Phenom... It is another means of communicating and expressing opinions, it is not the Only means, after all, IM has been around a very long time, Skype is direct and instant messaging, including vidoe, Oh, and there is still the old fashioned Dog and Bone.

I am gutted not to be attending the RTU and havent felt from the Tweets from Matt or Jamie that it was in any way exclusive just bloody hard to organise on no budget and no idea of interest - it was everything that web 2.0 stands for in the sense of it was "just rock up and we can all have a natter" perfectly positioned but I have one request - do more of them!!